The Penguins made 13 picks in the 2025 NHL Draft, including three in the first round, and we’re breaking them down! Patrick and Hunter break down a crazy weekend for the Penguins that included three first-round picks, 13 total picks, and multiple trades! They talk about the decision to take Ben Kindel 11th overall, why they traded down in the first round, and look at who is closest to becoming an NHL contributor out of their three first-round picks. Then, they discuss the rest of the draft, where the Penguins made 10 picks in rounds two through seven, as well as who they think could be a late-round steal. Finally, as part of a draft-day trade, the Penguins brought in Connor Clifton on defense. Will he be part of the plan long-term, or is this another trade deadline candidate?
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31 Comments
I gotta wait 2 hours for the here comes the beef review
We must really like you guys. I stuck around for the full 3. Yinz made that brutal draft tolerable 😂
I like Kindel more and more each time I watch him
Unless im mistaken kindle, hagens, potter and Ecklund were the only players under 6ft in the first round
I enjoyed day #2 a lot more. Can't wait to see how D'Aigle develops.
I liked the draft, just the horcoff pick not tô much, but thats ok
Dubas: > drafts a SOO Greyhound
Toxic Toronto: > Leonardo DiCaprio TV whistling meme
Please do more live streams!
Good show guys, thanks for the info
Hunter, I mean this with all the love in the world, please let Patrick finish his sentences 😂
Was fine with Kindel and Zonnon. Starting at Horcoff I wasn't as much of a fan.
Had an absolute blast in the live Yinz gotta do it some other time!
99 points for a smaller guy in the western league which is very defensive minded league unlike the Q is very good, these 3 are so happy to be a Penguin
Clifton with half cap held could fetch a pretty nice return at the deadline I think.
as a caps fan, happy you got Dubas, the bright side for pens fan is with him as GM you have a chance for Mckenna. dubis is all about drama in toronto and now all these moves up and down and you coud have got the same guys or better like caps first pick at 27,by doing nothing. drama Dubas
AWESOME
I like Kindel but I don't like that trade. I would have preferred Eklund or Aitcheson over Zonnon and Horcoff.
So we drafted bottom six and 3rd pair Dmen, smdh!
Yeah. So? All 13 combined will probably ever have the impact of a Crosby or Malkin. It’s good they had so many opportunities, but it is Quality over Quantity. We shall see.
Hey guys, lets remember going back to the sum of what the scouts basically said " outside the top few…..it's really a crap shoot!" Add to that some are are younger then others, different style leagues, haven't grown or filled out yet, going to school or not……its the draft AND this one was a weaker draft, correct?! Ok good……..deep breath! Now, I hope next year we end up with a couple 1st in the lottery, better chance at McKenna, and who knows, it'll all depend on what trades Dubas makes, could we end up with 3 1st picks??? Now, 2026 draft is deeper and more talented. With that being said, I would be awfully disappointed if he continued trading down to lesser talent. In a case like next year, I pray we receive some grace, move up via lottery, pick some excellent people, extremely talented, NHL ready players who can step in and truly start building our next generation of Pens!!!
Dubas has basically filled the bare cupboard with prospects in a year and a half. I think it is important to remember Patrick's point that these prospects are also trade chips
I'd give the draft a C-. They should have bet on upside with guys like Mooney, Spence, Benak, Ekberg, Boelius, etc. in round 2 through 7 instead of "safe" picks. All the guys selected that late have non NHLer (maybe not even AHLer) floors. So I'd rather take the ones who have middle 6/top 6 forward and top 4 defenseman upside and a low floor instead of guys with bottom 6 forward and #6/#7 defenseman upside and an equally low floor. Like Hunter, I also would've preferred if they had taken Eklund. He's one of the best in the draft class (the only guys I definitively have above him are Schaefer, Misa, Hagens, and Martone). Passing on him and letting a divisional rival get him is going to hurt us for the next decade or longer. If we had gone Eklund/Kindel in any order with picks 11 and 12 I think we'd be in a much better position since we'd be getting two blue chip prospects in the first round instead of one blue chip guy, a bottom/middle 6 guy (Zonnon), and a likely non NHLer (Horcoff).
People make so much out of prospect rankings when prospect rankings mean absolutely zero. Hornqvist was the last pick of the 05 draft and was a top 6 forward who was an integral part of the cup wins in 16 and 17. Yakupov was a consensus number 1 overall pick that was a bust that was at best a bottom 6 forward and wasn’t in the league long. Guentzel was a superstar that no one knew of before he actually got up to Pittsburgh because he was an undersized 3rd round pick. Rust the same way. This draft was so weak and bad that after the 1st 2 picks, everybody was pretty interchangeable. Frondell went 3rd and was projected to go anywhere from 3rd to 12. Hagens was the consensus number 1 pick to start the year and fell to 7. Brady Martin less than a week ago looked like he was going to drop to the pens but went 5th. Almost everybody had Seattle taking defense, specifically Mrtka because of their lack of d prospects and their over abundance of center prospects but take O’Brien. Some had Kindel as a top 10 talent, but because of his size fell. Eklund could have gone anywhere for 5-15 over the last week and ended up 16th. It’s all a crap shoot and people need to chill and stop overreacting. And stop acting like Kindel isn’t a projected top 6 forward lol. People claiming he has a bottom 6 ceiling are nuts.
Kindel’s comparable is Point. I’ll take that any day of the week. He’s likely a top 6 forward. Zonnon has the size of Staal and the net front presence of Hornqvist. He has a 2C ceiling but likely a solid 3rd C and I’ll take that for late 1st round. Horcoff has the size and nhl translatability. He will likely be a 4C in the nhl and that’s just fine as a late 1st round pick. They later picks are throwing darts at a board and hoping some stick. At the end of the day, the pens prospect system while better than previous drafts, was still bare and he needed to fill it first and next year is where you go for the real big swings in the draft. Especially if you can get 1st overall and get McKenna.
After that draft and making 13 picks it's apparent that Dubas is not worried about winning right now at all, his eyes are only on the future. He's currently building the 2027-2028 Penguins lol.
I’m sure you saw but Oliver Tulk got invited to camp as well!!! I’m excited about that. I’m still shocked he didn’t get drafted.
I hope that, eventually, we hear from Kyle and Wes the "why?" of their decision to pass on Eklund and others who were hyped as "possible top tens".
I'm most looking forward to seeing the development of Horcoff and Kettles. Both 6'5" , 205+ and they're both not done growing, yet.
It is a really interesting twist on the D'aigle pick that the pick used on him was originally the Wild's pick.
I thought it was a good draft. I think 6 of the drafted prospects could play nhl minutes in their careers. One not mentioned was brady peddle. Another big bodied defenseman. Really liked the tretheway pick. The young man said he models his game after charlie mcavoy. Nothing wrong with that. Pens fans need to relax and quit being armchair gm's. I know they're passionate but nothing dubas does makes them happy. Eklund might be a lil better prospect by the consensus but they're not always right. Its a guessing game with these young man. Kindel is too small is the biggest i heard. He actually weighs more then eklund. Time will tell. Maybe kindel is a bust, maybe eklund is a bust. Just saying give the young man a chance to develop before writing him off
Best picks in last 15 years for each pens draft spot and the 12th they traded away and avg point per game by playerin career.
🔢 11th Overall Picks (Top 3)
Draft Spot Player Position Avg. NHL Points/Year*
11 Mikko Rantanen RW/C ~65
11 Filip Forsberg LW ~55
11 Kevin Fiala RW/LW ~50
—
🔢 22nd Overall Picks (Top 3)
Draft Spot Player Position Avg. NHL Points/Year*
22 Kasperi Kapanen RW ~30
22 Olli Maatta D ~20
22 Max Pacioretty¹ LW ~50
¹ Pacioretty was drafted in 2007 but included for context
—
🔢 24th Overall Picks (Top 3)
Draft Spot Player Position Avg. NHL Points/Year*
24 Travis Konecny RW ~50
24 Evgeny Kuznetsov C ~55
24 Boone Jenner C/RW ~30
—
🔢 12th Overall Picks (Top 3)
Draft Spot Player Position Avg. NHL Points/Year*
12 Cam Fowler D ~15
12 Martin Necas RW/C ~45
12 Matthew Boldy LW ~40
—
* Points per year are approximate NHL regular season averages, based on full or partial NHL careers.